“THE FATE OF ARMENIA AND EUROPE TO BE TOGETHER WILL BE INEVITABLY REALIZED.”
October 29 2013
Interview with Country Director of Eurasia Partnership Foundation
Gevorg Ter-Gabrielyan – Mr. Ter-Gabrielyan, what do we lose from
Armenia’s change of Western orientation so far to the north, and
whether we win something? – Who are these we? I have not had any
orientation, apart from Armenian sovereignty. The fact that a man is
making a statement or writing a letter and then can do other deeds,
that, let’s say, will destroy a few number of covered market, has
nothing to do with my understanding of “we”. Thus, there has been
no change in orientation, because some people have orientation,
and some people did not have it or is addressed to other directions;
a man is oriented to his purse, his clan, and his boss. In general,
I have never been a supporter to orientation approach while discussing
the policy of Armenia. As a sovereign state, Armenia is obligated to
equally develop relations in all directions. – No matter how much we
talk about development of relations in all directions, at this moment
Armenian state that it enters into the Customs Union, in response
to which EU officials said that it is the choice of Armenia, and we
may forget about the Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement. –
In this case, we have a situation that is very specific, outside of
orientation, a large project will not to be implemented with the most
powerful economic force. Naturally, Armenia will suffer from it. The
sooner Armenia becomes a country free from visa to visit Europe,
sooner Armenian becomes a country with a full right to study and work
in Europe, sooner universities of Armenia become adaptable to European
universities with curriculum and standards, quicker Armenia overcomes
the challenges to meet the European standard of goods to be competitive
in Europe with its products, more Europeans come to Armenia to live,
work, do business, wander in the North Avenue, use Tatev ropeway,
more Armenia participates in discussion of the fate of other countries
with its European counterparts … more powerful, safer, stronger,
more capable, more benefit, more secure Armenia will become.
– Will the project of joining the Customs Union be realized? – Maybe
not. May be it was Putin’s aim to show that he can make Armenia to do
nomenclature, whatever he wants, that’s all, to to refuse from seeming
beneficial option. May be his goal is to enslave, russify Armenia. May
be it is Armenia’s nomenclature. But, let’s assume that this process
continues, whether Russia is against corruption. No. On the contrary.
Corruption flourishes there. Is Russia against the sole authority? No.
On the contrary. Russia has created a system where the decisions in
this huge country, from bottom to top, are made solely. Then given
person can suffer, but as long as it is a wide-scale official, the
decisions are in its hands, and nothing can be done against it. The
cult of xenophobia is flourishing in Russia. Putin said something
‘the court changes the decision’. Putin said that it was not a
piracy, in one night Greenpeace’s charges was transformed into a heavy
hooliganism of piracy. It reaches ridicule. What will Russia bring to
Armenia? Cult of the official. Cult of xenophobia. Cult of Putin. Cult
of policeman. Moreover, cult of unfair, fearful police. Cult of
corruption. Cult of Gulag. Cult of nomenclature church. Absence of a
court. Extremely corrupted judges. Corruption of a huge part of media.
Announcing civil society the main threat, together with the West.
Declaring civil society internal enemy. Of course, he is an enemy,
enemy to this nomenclature. But, the country is not the nomenclature.
Civil society is the country. It’s all that Armenia’s nomenclature,
and large sections of the people will copy Russia with pleasure,
voluntarily. They are in a hurry to copy it, this was just what they
wanted from inside, and they were building it to the extent of their
capacity, although everything still was not clearly defined. In
addition, Russia will bring the contempt towards Armenians. Its
typical contempt, which is not much, especially directed to Armenians,
or even other Caucasus or post-Soviet ‘dark complexion’ nations, to
any other nation, because Russian people with its massive kind never
had the opportunity and the remedy to learn to respect other people’s
culture. It inspires reverence to some cultures if it reveres these
nations, such as the Great Britain. But it does not respect other
people’s culture as such, regardless of the size and wealth of the
nation. Why? Because there is a great-power chauvinism, which was
cultivated for centuries, and has never been cultivate the opposite. –
Life made you live in the Soviet territory and in Europe. What
are the cultural differences? – Today’s major cultural differences
between Europe and the former Soviet Union are as follows: in Europe,
the educated man does not much differ from illiterate, because the
number of illiterate is few. There is a unified standard of education,
which corresponds to a large part of masses. Here, in Armenia and RF,
it is a barrier: the educated and illiterate are unable to understand
each other. In twenty years, we probably lost the best thing that the
USSR had given to us: more or less equal education. In Europe, people
are not afraid of the police; police is the friend of the citizen. In
Europe, tolerance is not an empty word; man is truly free in his
private life, to live the way he wants to, if he does not disturb
others. Even if he bothers nomenclature with his demonstrations,
he will not be suit to court for it and will not be put to jail, if
his has merely held a demonstration, it is just against nomenclature,
at the pleasure of single high-rank official. In Europe, believers
and atheists do not attack each other, tolerating each other they are
living side by side. In Europe, the There migrants coming from other
cultures mostly get adapted and study, become European. In Europe,
the states are working for the welfare of the people, more or less.
However, large parts of nomenclature are not constantly engaged in
criminal crime. – You present Europe the way you see it, the way I
have seen and thousands of our citizens, but a campaign has started
in Armenia, in which Europe is presented as a vicious regime. –
What I said are tendencies, there are also exceptions. Why does it
seem to the philistine that Europe is in a disastrous situation? Let’
assume that announcing this is not a political order, but an honest
opinion of an honest philistine. There are two things to say here:
one that information flows have been multiplied, the news should
mainly be about bad, it is a sensation, drawing attention, and thus,
philistine receives information that something bad has happened in
Europe, and then generalizes that as if it is bad there. It is clear
that only the stupid can undiscussingly approach the information, to
believing it directly. Only an uneducated person can generalize one
case and announce that the whole is such. For example, if an Armenian
or Russian did bad to him, to announce that the entire nation is bad.
(Also pay attention to what news is coming from the RF, let’s recall
also our personal efforts in Russia). There is one more consideration:
the torrent of this very negative news that is propagated nowadays that
as if Europe is on the verge of collapse, it had begun centuries ago
in Europe. Since early 20th century, it had become a full developed
ideology that Europe is on the verge of collapse, it is doing to
recession, sunset. It is simply self-criticism, self-alertness, we
are constantly going to recession to rise again. We are constantly on
the verge of collapse, we exaggerate, as if now, right now we will be
destroyed to avoid it from happening. We are not ashamed to publicly
show our illnesses, our problems to us and others.
We do not declare that as if we believe that the strong leader, the
police and our dear KGB will solve all these issues. This transparency
helps to overcome them. This is what Europe says. Let the naive
Armenians do not believe the declination of Europe. Although, I do
not think that there are many of such naive Armenians. The majority of
people have been there and have seen with their own eyes. Of course,
there might be a person who even does not believe his eyes. But he
seems believing the nomenclature. It’s something else. Those who
insist on this are executing a political order. – And in reality? –
In reality, Europe is flourishing. And it is less likely to expect harm
from enlightened flourishing forces than from dark and rotten force.
It is not necessary to be Kant to understanding this. Enlightened
flourishing force benefits even to its colonies, not to speak
about partners. Get closer to Europe, and your nomenclature will be
educated, less, accountable, hard-working, capable, receiving high
salary and mainly non-corrupt. The unemployed will be more or less
safe, and the government will be concerned in the matter of giving
him job. Your prison will be a place where you, the stray, strive to
spend winter season there, it’s so comfortable there. But, problems
are everywhere. Yes, if migrants are living in Ghetto, sooner or later
they will come out into the street, like in Britain or in France,
and will try to forcedly protest against their desperate situation,
which is the issue of their identity. They can not become a European,
if they live in Ghetto, and can not remain underdeveloped. They turn
blue from it. If the state pays for itself very much and is fast and
dissipated, sooner or later the whole society will suffer, like in
Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Greece. But, is it better to be destroyed
than to hold harsh reforms to correct the situation? Here, in contrast
to Europe, robbery, unjust and desperateness is everywhere. But,
it is also possible to get rich in Russia, if you agree to pillage,
and as it is a great and powerful country, sometimes one can also
become rich with less pillage, in other words, pillage, of course,
but with more shamelessly than your surroundings, on the contrary,
plunder with more conscience. Now, the hope of our keen ones is this
that getting close to Russia, they will plunder with more conscience
than others and will prosper. But, let’s be honest: such nomenclature
that we know, whether our dear nomenclature could realize this Great
and Comprehensive Goodwin agreement, in reality. Of course, never. We
were deceiving ourselves, so as Europe when saying ‘it’s ok’, let
them sign, then they will start the reform, in the meantime, it’s
ok, let them plunder little by little, let the not be transformed,
let the injustice continue. But, when they sign, says Europe, they
will have no way out.
Is it possible to implement such a compound reform with this
nomenclature and under these conditions? Of course, not. Actually,
nomenclature was lying to Europe, Europe was lying to itself and us,
we were lying us a little bit, it was not ever going to be that this
nomenclature, at least, signed this agreement, that it could handle
it. It was not going to happen and did not happen. But, it will take
some time, the nomenclature will change, and the fate of Armenia and
Europe to be together will be inevitably realized. And as for Russia,
however it wants, if it wants, let it join, if not, the writer Vladimir
Sorokin has already described the fate expected to isolated Russia,
for example, in his work “Kremlin made of Sugar”.
Interviewed by Melania BARSEGHYAN
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